Bug

 

            I'm glad to be rid of him. Freedom tastes sweet, and you take it for granted until you've got to drag some dead weight around on the march. And that's just what the goddamned Bug was to me--dead weight.

            Now I'm my own boss again, with no whining little jerk to put up with, no complaining snot-nosed brat asking dopey questions, and slowing me down as I move with the herd.

            I'm from North Bergen, New Jersey on Earth; I was five years old when the ray came down on my house. I can sort of remember my dad. He had a clean, smooth chin, like a kid's. I remember my mom looking pretty, and yelling at me not to go too close to the swimming pool, in the summer.

            It had pale blue water and a funny smell, and white steps leading down into it (unless I dream this shit) and you could feel really cool and clean in it, feel like you were flying. But Mom always told me to play in my little inflatable pool, on the grass . . .

             I remember her face, and the way she screamed the night the ray came down; I looked up from the living room floor, where I was playing with my dumptrucks. I think we'd heard of human-gathering rays, but far away, in other places.                                                                                                                                   

            The light stung my eyes, and Mom screamed, and my stomach dropped, and suddenly I was lying on the matted grasses of the hold, with fat old people moaning and crawling over each other. It stank, and I couldn't eat the protein grubs that They poured into the troughs. I guess I expected food to have a nice taste, like something I remember called chocolate Yoohoo. It was so sweet, your whole tongue felt good.

            I got weak on the ship, and cried a lot. I almost died.

            But I didn't die. Once we docked, I got smart. I got wiry and quick, and attached myself to the herd. I learned to eat grubs--to muscle in and get some before the trough emptied. I learned to pluck off parasites before they burrowed into my shoulder. I learned to run, head down, and not get zapped, and make sure some big person was always between me and the punishment rod.

            Sometimes in the evening, when my group was bedding down, I'd listen to the English speakers talking. They seemed to feel better when they told jokes and sang songs--and told about something called TV Trivia. I remember what a TV looks like, and what cartoons were, but I guess I never saw this Trivia.

            They would say the Herders just want To Serve Man--like that was some kind of big, nasty joke. I didn't understand it, and never asked. I guess I learned some stuff about Earth, listening to these poor suckers. But I was a lot quicker to adapt than they were; I learned the ways of 

the herd. Some old losers would get here, and even before their beards grew in, they would wind up as what we call 'fast-food'--dinner for the Herders--without even being fattened or shipped. And some of the soft breeders would arrive, and just waste away, instead of increasing the herd like they're supposed to.

            As I got bigger, I stopped traveling with one set group. Now I weave in and out of different groups, bed down with whichever one is on the highest ground, above the swampland, then the next morning dart over to another group's trough to swipe some grubs . . .

            I used to get away with it because I was a kid. Now I'm big and mean, though my chin is still smooth and hairless, and no one fucks with me or else I'll fuck them up. I take care of Number One, and I do a good job. I figure I got maybe up to ten more years with the herd, before They fatten me up and ship me.

            How I ran into the Bug was, They were leading us down a hillside, into a canyon. The high ground was parched; the Herders try to stay one step ahead of the drought, and move us toward marshland, where there are plenty of protein grubs to dig. The path down the side of the cliff was very narrow and steep, and rocks crumbled beneath your toes and rolled off the edge--and took a couple of poor suckers with them.

            We were marching in tight bunches, slowly, and then I heard rocks crumbling behind me, and felt something attach

itself to my leg. I looked down. There was this little                     

bastard, fingers digging into my thigh, nearly pulling me over the side. We had to keep moving, so I yanked him up, and carried him. He clung to my neck, and buried his head in my shoulder, and it made the march that much more hot and sticky, heavy and dangerous.

            When we got to the bottom, we collapsed on these flat, humongous rocks, while They filled our troughs with water. I went with the little bastard to scoop some water. Then I asked him what group he was traveling with--where his mom was. He just stared at me with big eyes, and rubbed his hand against his face.

            I figured finally he couldn't talk. I figured he hadn't been gathered from Earth. He was probably born here, and a lot of those kids don't make it, and those that do are pretty fucked in the head. A lot of them never bother to learn to talk. A lot of them wind up as a special tender treat on Their tables. Maybe this kid hadn't wound up that way because he was kind of funny-looking. He had a high, wrinkly forehead, and little round ears, and he always held his mouth rounded and slightly open, like a hole. He cocked his head to one side, and looked at me weird.

            With my hand I pointed to where the rest of the herd were lounging, picking parasites off each other, and I shouted for him to go find his group. Then I walked off the other way. The brat follows me. I see him trying to walk like me. It pissed me off.

            When I bedded down that night, he bedded down next to me. I punched him until he crawled away and sat sniveling a

few feet off--then he comes creeping back, when he thinks I'm asleep. I couldn't get rid of him--it was like trying to pick off a parasite when it's already half-buried in your skin.

            I called him Bug because he was ugly. Because that's another thing I remember from the swimming pool: these things like parasites, only bigger, floating around at the top of the water. Some were skinny and black; some were fat and had wings. Sometimes they were still wriggling their skinny legs on the water when you saw them; sometimes they were already floating still. I used to like to rescue the wriggling ones, and watch them dry out on the cement patio near the lawn. Even the dead-looking ones would sometimes get full of energy from the Earth sun, and start moving their feelers, and then their legs, and go slowly crawling off into the grass. It made me feel powerful and good when that happened, like I had brought them back to life.

            Mom didn't like me playing with the bugs. She said they might sting me, or I might fall in the pool. She said maybe they were diseased. A lot of the bugs looked kind of gross, and it annoyed me when I fished out a dead one and it stayed dead. This little kid was gross and annoying, so "Bug" seemed like the right name to give him.

            Finally, I decided it was easier to just put up with Bug following me around. I taught him to run with his limbs pulled in, and his head down, especially when They came whirring close by. I taught him to say a few words--like "why," which he'd whine over and over when I told him to do something. And I taught him "Kevin," my name. It felt strange to hear it, after so much time.              

            I taught him how to judge a grub--how the ones with discolored veins were already rotting inside. The stupid little jerk didn't know how to do anything for himself. His nose was running all the time, and he'd tug on my hand for me to carry him during the march, and then cling to me till I almost couldn't breathe. At night he'd do weird things, like hop around and make hooting noises, and I'd call him a spaz and a stupid fuck, and he'd only laugh and come nuzzling up to me, which made me feel kind of dumb.

            A couple of times, I tried to give Bug to one of the young breeders in the herd. There was one I really liked, with yellow hair; sometimes I would travel behind her, just to watch her body move. But Bug screwed up his face all ugly, and she wouldn't have anything to do with him. She didn't really like me, and stayed close to her group, which is what a lot of the breeders do. It probably scared her, the way I

go where I please, and how I had this disturbed little Bug to take care of.

            Once, as we were marching through the canyon, we came to a giant watering hole. The Herders reclined on the big rocks, to watch us, as we went splashing into the water, letting out yells. The Bug seemed scared, but I grabbed him by the arms, and swung his feet around in the water, like maybe my dad once did with me, and sang some dumb old song about three little fishies and a mama fishie too, that I didn't even know I knew. 

            Soon the Bug was gurgling and looking happy, and trying to kick water on me. The water was kind of slimy, not like that swimming pool in our yard in North Bergen, but I think it was a little bit like flying--not for me, but maybe for the Bug. He just flopped down across my belly to sleep that night, exhausted, and every breath to come out of his little round mouth was like a sigh.

            There was more water, further on in that march. We had climbed out of the canyon, having eaten most of the grubs there, and They were herding us across a great plain, when the sky erupted, and sheets of rain came pelting down on us. The Herders were furious. They hate rain, when there is no shelter at hand. They can't sleep in it, and it messes up Their equipment. They hovered among us, urging us to run faster, and zapping at everyone with punishment rods--only the rods were scorching people's flesh, and making some suckers drop down, 'cause of the rain. It did something to the rods, made them worse.

            Soon the whole herd panicked, and we were stampeding. You couldn't see, the sky was so dark, and water was in your

eyes, but everyone was running forward, their feet sloshing in the mud, and thunder was exploding in the sky, and the Herders couldn't even control us anymore. We just ploughed on, and you heard yells from suckers who fell and were trampled underfoot, and that scared people more.            

            I was running with the Bug at my side, but he couldn't run fast, and the assholes around us were stepping on him, and our hands were so slippery, I was afraid I'd lose my grip on him.

            So I swung him up on my hip, but that made it hard for me to keep my balance, and I was panting, and tripping, and running so hard my chest hurt, and every breath hurt as I sucked it in, and it all was very fast so it's hard to remember or explain exactly, but the Bug couldn't get a good grip on my arm, it was so slick with rain, and I shifted him on my hip as I ran, and I guess someone jostled us as I shifted him, and the Bug got ripped away from me, and I heard him make one of his little noises, and then my head was turning around in the darkness, but my feet kept moving forward, because the herd was moving, like a wave, and I was  

part of it, and I kept yelling "Bug! Bug!" like an idiot, and even trying to go back for him. But the Bug was gone.

            Which is a good thing, really. Because he was slowing me down, and eating too many grubs that should have wound up in my belly, and making me look stupid, and making me go against

the routine I've worked out for myself.

            Sometimes, now, when I move from one group to another, to muscle in on a sleeping area or a trough, I search around and look at the little boys--and one time I even thought I saw the Bug, but when I ran over to him and hugged him, it turned out to be some other kid. He wriggled away and ran squealing back to his breeder. It figures--he was way too cute to be the Bug.

            Let's face it, Bug was a useless little runt, and he never would have made it, anyhow, right? He would have wound up as a tender treat on some table eventually, ugly or not, or else as fast-food for the Herders. I'm not sorry about what happened to him, and I don't feel responsible, and I'll never be dumb enough to let another member of the herd latch on to me and try to live off me--ever. That mushy stuff is for breeders and the suckers that've just arrived. You can hope or not or hug a little kid or not--we all taste the same in the end.          

            I look out for Number One. I'm better off without the whiny little fucking asshole, I never asked for an ugly, lame-ass parasite in the first place--if he was too stupid and too weak to hold on, was that my problem? Should I be all heartbroken? Should I feel guilty? I take care of me, and not some little spasmo, some ugly, stupid, fucking loser, some useless, wacked-out little Bug . . .